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TVA Fast Track Incentives: The Easiest Way to Save on LED Lighting · Watts Up with Bowling Green Winlectric

• Savannah Gillispie: Hey guys, thanks for joining us with our latest episode of What's Up with Wind Electric. As always, I'm Sean, and this is Ty and Robert with TVA. And they're gonna help us understand a little bit more about the TVA incentives that are available and how they can help us out in understanding them and what money they can put in our pockets. So, guys, if you don't mind, Ty and Robert, just for those of you who are watching, not listening, of course. But can you tell us a little bit first about yourselves? Perfect. I'll go first. So John, thanks for having us. Really appreciate being here. my name's Robert Mason. I am the business development manager for the T VA Energy Rate program. been doing working with TVA for a little over ten years now. I've seen the program kind of grow and contract and right now we're in an expansion period, which is great, but our whole role as a team are to help work with vendors like yourself. electrical contractors, architects engineers, and help educate them about the incentives and have you guys feel empowered to go to your customers and talk about the incentives and help raise the money. Right. So what got you into this role? where'd you come from so tell us your last story. Funny enough my my dad has been in the energy industry or was in the energy industry for a little over forty plus years. Wow I was got my degree in marketing, had no desire to do any kind of energy efficiency, but I graduated in 2010 and that's when the market absolutely plummeted. Right. found a random job in Syracuse, New York, moved up there and was doing direct install programs, so selling lights and HVAC units to small businesses. ended up moving down to Nashville to work on the big commercial C and I side and one way or another got pushed over from the vendor side to the incentive side. Gotcha. And I've been with the T VA program ever since. Gotcha. Now Ty, tell us a little bit about you and how you got started with TVA. Yeah, so I'm Ty Burklew, I am the business developer for the Kentucky area for the TVA energy right incentives. Unlike Robert, I'm new to the program. I'm about four to five months in. you're baby. I know, right, I know, right. So exactly. So how I got into it was I've been in throughout my career many different things. I've been in manufacturing, also nonprofit things like that. The funny thing is when I was in manufacturing many, many years ago, we participated in the TVA, a rapid re response program using energy during the peak demands. So I knew about the program when I heard about it. It kinda always interests me and I love the manufacturing side of it. So I had the opportunity and I'm excited to be a part of the team in the program. Nice, nice. So coming from my side of it, which is electrical distribu distribution side, when The TVA incentives first announced, we were like, Finally And then we were like, Wow, that's a lot of work. And we fairly quickly became a PPN partner, pr preferred partner network is is what it is. And to tell the listeners a little bit about P P N, I guess before I go up further than what I was gonna say, can you actually explain what a PPN partner is? so the the Fuggers Network is our version of what Nationally it's called like a a trade ally program. So utilities will partner with vendors within their territory and across the nation to help facilitate projects for you know their customers. So it's a it's a way to kind of empower contractors and vendors within their area to then say, Hey, Mr. Customer, we can help you get some money. We've partnered with X utility, in this case TBA, and we can go out and get you some money. And we do that because there's only now seven of us, and there's 500 plus PPNs in our network. Right. You will can promote the program way better than we can. And also you're the experts within your field. So what what I kind of explained to our customers and even the end users and what it really means for us being a PPN partner is that you have to go through us to get to y'all. In a sense. So we're we're in a sense like a liaison between the end user and T V A. Is that is that the w an easy that's good, 'cause I'm glad I've been saying that. No, no, that's that's that's a hundred percent. You know, 'cause Ty and I we can't we can't go out and start talking with customers directly. Our our kind of role as a program are you know, the local power companies are our customers. Right. The end use customers are not our customers. So we have to make sure that the local power companies feel comfortable with us being in the field. However, you all have still the business. So we can kind of go through the PPN and make sure that the program is is talked about through you all. So that's kind of our avenue. Yeah, I I really haven't had I really hadn't thought of that. Even with talking to you guys, and I think one of you actually mentioned it at the store one day and I still don't think it actually made the the impact that it just did when you said is the end user, you know, Myself as a homeowner, I am not your customer. Your customer is EPB or in Warren County, WRECC or you know Balling Green Like so so wow that's I just I guess that never really hit me is it that was I mean I mean T VA as a whole just seems like this big entity and everyone knows T VA but at the end of the day that that local power company are the people that we have to sure respect and make sure that you know their their needs are being met. However, at the end of day, like their customers are are coming to us too. So we have to make that balance and make sure that we're respecting everyone's boundaries. So getting back to what I was saying before before I so rudely interrupted myself, but is that is that initially we were like, Great, TVA gotta has a program, rebate program, and then it was like a lot of work and we very quickly became on once we learned about it, became a PPM partner and you know, we did a few jobs, but man Quite frankly, the end user just didn't want to go through all the different steps it took and it took so long to process and so delayed. So now that leads me into n with what you guys started probably what like a year ago or two years ago, which is the fast track program. Yep. I couldn't think of the word program for a second. So the fast track program, which it is exactly as it is stated. It's a fast track to get that rebate. So make Ty, would you Tell a little bit about the fast track? So that's as you mentioned, you know, our standard LED you can set up is a little bit longer process. You have to do that application, get submitted, go through the approval with that fast track is for the situations where, okay, I've been approved of this additional capital to get these lights in. I need to get it installed now before they change their mind. so then the way the fast track is you're able to do that project, which includes five different fixtures that we had the pre-approved. You have our T eight's two foot, four foot U-bend, then also two by two and two by four panels that You take out your current lights, put those lights in, then you'll qualify for a set amount per light fixture. Yeah. And you can apply for six months after the job's completed. So that's the great thing about it. You don't have to wait for the pre-approval, things like that. Yeah, that's on the kind of the standard rebate, is you have to get approval on it, which means you have to go through all these steps. I'm not gonna get into all that because I'll maybe talk about that at a later time, but you have to go through a lot of hoops, which It's beneficial. I'm not trying to say it's not beneficial in the long run, but you do have to get approval, which means you can't start the job until that approval happens. And a lot of times what we were coming into is the end user was like, No, I I need this to go now And so it seems like they don't make the decision until it's time to start, you know? So but the fast track is amazing and just like you said, two foot, three foot no, excuse me. Yeah, two foot, three foot, four foot, two two foot two foot and four foot. Two foot and four foot and U bend. I knew better than that. And then the two by twos and the two by fours. Really what we've seen the most of is of course the four foot tubes, the two by twos and two by fours. Yep. And it really is, guys, if you're watching, you can see my eyes, big eyes, it really is that easy. Like it seems like it's still gonna be a little complicated, but it's not. Yeah. So I know we mentioned before the process, but can you actually go step by step as to how easy the process is? And and I'll I'll kind of get into it a little bit too as to why we even created this is for the exact reason that we're talking about is that we identified and we have heard from our vendors and customers again for a number of years that hey we can't wait for pre approval. We would love to participate, but we need lights in today. And in the past we'd like, all right, we'll make an exception and at a certain point you're breaking the rules to help, you know, your customer be able to kind of get these lights in. So we understand there is a need for customers to get these lights in right away. And it's not that they don't want to participate, they just they they have these hurdles that are kind of unavoidable. And so you we created this and a lot of utility programs have rebate style incentives. We've always been a fairly heavy pre approved program. And so now we're trying to address the need in the marketplace for a traditional rebate so that customers can go out and and get these. And from a program standpoint, what what we're trying to benefit is we're trying to capture energy savings. and so now we have all this data that we've collected throughout, you know, the decade or so that we've run this program that we can comfortably say, okay, if you install a four foot LED or you install a flat panel. We know that we're gonna get X amount of savings from from your building. So we feel comfortable now being able to allow customers to hey, we we just install these sites, great. We probably know we're gonna get that much savings. We know that you're gonna get that much savings. So everyone kind of you know benefits at the end. but I'll let I'll let Ty kind of go through the process, but I kinda wanted to give that background as to why we're now doing that. And I do think in the future, you know We will likely look at expanding that measure because it is very popular and it's beneficial to a lot of customers. Yeah, so tell us about how super complicated it is to go through the process on the fast track. luckily, like you said, it's been very simplified from a standpoint of where you know customer can come to you. They say we want to put those two by two or two by fours in. It's as simple as getting a head count of the functional lights that you're going to replace and then the account of lights that you're going to put in that are in the fast track qualification. And then you're gonna get a set of dollar set dollar amount per light or fixture you put in. So it's a straight, that's Robert said we have the calculations, we know what the savings are gonna be. So the customer we get that dollar amount of savings. So if you put in a hundred of those lights, you're gonna get a hundred times the dollar amount right that you put in. Then what you're able to do is go and do it fill out that application. The work's already been done, the last light is installed, and a grid point two, that six months starts once that final light is finished. So it's not when that first light's done, you have six months to get it in. It's when that final light. So you truly have even more longer than six months if it's a longer time. So if you have maybe you have a a few different areas that you're doing and you can't do them all at the same time because you can't have all those areas down, you can do the first area, move to the second, move to the third, and then you have that time frame in between when that fat f li last one is finished, you still have the six months after. Absolutely. To be honest with you, man, I keep forgetting about the six months. You know, which I know there's a time frame in there but but I'm I'm kinda still a little bit misbelieving that it's actually six months. That's a long time to be able to and and it literally the whole appro quote approval process, which means just filling out that it's like takes you longer to go to the website and click on what you need to do. Like to it's it literally it's not it is so uncomplicated now, which is why we've been so excited about the the program. Back to one of the things that you mentioned, Ty, is that it actually does only apply to working current working fixtures. Yes, sir. So if you have half of your warehouse is out, then you can only retro the working fixtures to get rebate. So one kind of yes and no to that. And this is where fast track is a little bit different than our pre-approval, right? So since we are not inspecting, the warehouse and we are giving deemed values for savings. At the end of the day, it's the new lights that really only concerned about. Okay. and there is kind of a gray area too with like a new construction or kind of a a remodel of an existing space where fast track can play a part. so it is a very flexible incentive in that regard. Whereas if we were looking at pre approval where we're paying truly now on Are these lights operating? Are they working? And we have to validate that savings. With Fast Track, since we're kind of taking a a wide kind of breath at kind of what the savings is, we do have that flexibility now to say, sure, hey, did you install fifty of these two by fours and maybe, you know, before you got in here fifty didn't work? Or, you know, twenty five didn't work, we're gonna pay you on that fifty that you bought and installed. Gotcha. So there is there is some flexibility in that where on the pre approval side, you're exactly right. We would not pay you one on that. I kind of just did want to get clarification on that part. I I didn't want that to to go by and but that makes it easier now because like Ty said, give us your invoice, give us your spec sheet. I will pay you on what you bought and installed. Right, exactly. So let's talk a bit about the real meat and potatoes of the program, which is the dollars you get back per item installed. Because that's the second most shocking thing. The first most shocking thing to me is the six months time that you get to qualify that you get to apply after the installation. But the real the the actually biggest thing is the dollar amount you get back. You want to talk about that, Tom? Yeah, absolutely. I brought my cheat sheet just to make sure I, you know, spell things right. But as we mentioned on those two foot linear tubes, the TH you're gonna get that three dollars per tube that you put on there. then with the four foot, you're getting that four dollar, with the U-bend, you're getting the seven dollar. And then the larger amount, those two by twos, you're getting that 20, other $18. And then the 4x4s, you're getting that $22. Or $2x4s are getting that $22. So to put that in perspective, let's say somebody is retrofitting a 2x4 lay-in fixture, and they're going to keep the tubes, they're not going to change the whole fixture. They're going to retrofit the tubes. That's $4 per tube. So you're going to get back $16 to do that fixture. To put that in perspective, we're typically selling a four foot two tube, depending on quantity, around six or seven dollars a tube. That is an enormous discount. And then when you're talking about a two by four flat panel, you know, though at twenty three twenty two or twenty three dollars. I have to look at my cheese. The two by four, they're twenty two dollars. Twenty two dollars, yes sir. I sh I had to look at my I got that cheat sheet right by my desk. But at twenty two dollars, I mean, again, we're selling those things for like, you know, upper thirties or so now. So you're literally looking at, you know, fifty percent or more that you're getting back for something you're probably doing anyway. Absolutely. And on top of that you're gonna save on the energy consumption that you're putting in there. So you're like triple tabbing on that. And and I will say too, for for our program, and it's good to know, is that Our incentive is capped at seventy percent of material cost. So oftentimes you can get in a situation where the lamps that you're buying, maybe five or even four dollars if you're buying in big enough bulb. Sure. So we're not gonna cover a hundred percent, but you can almost at a certain point say like this rebate will cover almost seventy percent of that cost in and of itself. Likely we do see fifty to sixty percent of that cost being covered. And that's that's that's a big that's a big chunk. And one of the reasons that we've seen at the store about you know fifty to sixty percent savings is because of the the quantity. Because let's talk you know, about the minimum 'cause you just talked about the maximum cap, let's talk about the minimum. What is the lowest amount, the requirements the minimum requirement for the TV? So yeah, honor programs the minimum requirement on the incident is a hundred fifty. So that project be able to be submitted and go through the process that has to get that minimum. A hundred and fifty. So that is again, realistically, it's like eight to well less than eight two by four. I mean it's nothing very small project. But what I also want to point out about that is you don't wanna just if you have a a an area that you have a hundred two by fours, you don't want to just do ten at a time or twenty at a time. And why would that be? Because You only do three mm. Yeah, you only do three at a time. Th three So you want to make sure that you're at least submitting an enough fixtures that you get over that one hundred fifty dollar. But can't you you can only do three incentives per physical address or unless that's changed, right? Am I misremembering something? You can you can do you can do as many as you want. Really? Do as many as you want. I thought it was limited to three You can do you can do as many applications for that address as you want. I made something of it. I've been telling customers you could do three. No, you can do as many as you want for that address. Now, I I I wouldn't advise it, only because it's just a lot of work for everyone's part. However, I know people, you know, maybe can't can't can't quite do that. So Right. Yeah. I would you know, we always we always say do as much as you can. And the other day too, the longer you wait to do an energy project, the more money you were wasting. You are you are eating you are eating into your bill day after day, month after month. And it may not feel like that because you're so used to paying that electric bill. But that is that is a that's a lesson that is is hard to grasp is that the longer I wait, I know this is a capital project, but you're wasting money. Yeah. Every day spending on on on your tele bill. I know it's kind of a fixed cost and a sum cost, but it's something that you should consider. I mean it's almost like a one of you know some the stuff that's hidden cost, you know, almost like a tax that you don't know that you're paying. And and you just don't feel it until it until it's finally gone, you're like, I why did I wait so long to do that? Right. And lighting is a very low hanging fruit to get money back in your pocket. Right, right. And a great thing you were talking about the minimum is too that I have talked to a lot of customers that they're like, my project's too small. Talk to small churches or talk to small businesses. And I was like, no there's not. I mean $150 minimum, it's an opportunity for every type of small, large business. All so we want to capture as much energy and provide as much savings we can. Right. We always encourage Bring it to us, bring it to the PPN. I mean all they can say is no, but typically it's going to be large enough to qualify. And just to point out again, if somebody was interested in doing you know, getting involved in the T V A incentives, the fast track is probably the easiest way to do that. And then also they would want to contact a PPA partner or could they go directly to T VA's website? Okay. So they can contact us, they can contact Ty. obviously we encourage everyone to go through partners like yourself. You know the rules, you're selling these projects. and we always are gonna push them over to you all too. But if they want to learn about the program, figure out next steps, we're we're we're resources to help. Okay, and what's the website they could go to? So TVA is that has their energy right instead of pro website they can go to. There's gonna be a different form on there they can fill out and the different interests that's gonna go through the channels. Then it's going to end up at our mailbox where we can reach out. They can also have a great feature on the website, find the PPN find a contractor. So they can go in there, put in their local zip code, check the boxes they're looking for, then those in those different PPNs are gonna pop up, and then they can reach out to them directly and say, Hey, have this project, you're in the preferred partner network, can you help me get that going? So instead of having to do all that, guys, just call us at Bowling Green Wind Electric 2708-426153. Absolutely. Now So to kind of tie it all together, super easy program. TVAs actually hit this one out of the park. I know you mentioned before, looking at expanding it into different types of fixtures, possibly on the industrial, commercial industrial side a little bit further, which I'm excited about personally because I sell a lot of those fixtures that you're talking about. I don't want to mention it just in case it doesn't go through. But super easy to do, really quick and easy to do. Get a lot of money back and who doesn't want more money in their pocket. Absolutely. So guys, wanna thank Ty and Robert for stopping in with us today. Take I told you, man. Geez. It's so bad. You had it right. You had it right. I know I should have just rolled with it. But I'd rather be, you know, make sure I'm right. But anyway, wanna thank them for coming in, talking with us about TVA's incentive program, specifically the fast track. Now, we are gonna have another episode with them coming up that's gonna go a little bit more in depth into some of the other programs they offer. So you're not gonna wanna miss that one too. Can't tell you when that one's gonna air yet. We'll see. Thanks again guys with joining us with What's Up with Wind Electric.